


spilled remchik

by EtoileGarden



Category: Queen's Thief - Fandom, Thick as Thieves - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Fluff, M/M, Sweet, Trauma, Violence, even if i keep writing awful things happening to them, relationship, they are in love ok and i love them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-31
Updated: 2017-05-31
Packaged: 2018-11-07 06:57:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11053689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EtoileGarden/pseuds/EtoileGarden
Summary: More on events of Costis' and Kamet's life in Roa. What the gods give, they can take away also.Can be read as a follow up to either 'Comet's in the Dark', or 'Things Never Fall into Place Easily'.





	spilled remchik

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry for writing so many angst filled fics.

It is a beautifully bright day. I had spent the majority of it outside, sitting in the shade of our cloth awning, writing to my heart’s content about nothing in particular. The world around me was abuzz with insects, birds, the zing of the breeze.  
Even my bones felt at peace, still and quiet among the noise of the world, as if they could rest now. Maybe my hand was moving quickly, writing word after word, but my being was as still as night.  
It was a mixture of things really; the sun so soft on my skin, the months without trouble from the mainland, the withdrawal of night terrors, the freedom I had been granted, the constant presence of my Costis.  
Whether it was just one of these, or all of them, I was happy.  
I have heard it said that the gods test the happiest the hardest. As if they see the humans finally breathing freely and think, what if they think this is their own doing? So they put them to trial until they return to their gods with renewed vigor.  
I am probably being too dramatic with all of this, but I say to you, from the very depths of my guts, that this is what I felt.  
Costis returned in the early evening, when the light was golden and the air around seemed thick with stillness.  
He smiled at me when he came down our path, stops by my side and closes his eyes as he reaches down to kiss me sweetly.  
I am not prepared when he reaches into his satchel and pulls out a bottle, his face taken up with a hopeful smile. 

“I bought this today,” he says, and he sounds proud of himself, “I had heard it was the favourite drink in Medea and I thought maybe you would like some.”  
It is a small bottle of remchik. Very cheap stuff, nothing like the liquor I’d poured for my master, drank with my master, tasted on my master.  
I can already feel my face stiffening before I fully comprehend what it is he is holding.  
Costis notices immediately, his own face dropping, he looks quickly at the bottle again.  
“Oh,” he says, “I know it’s not the nicest, it’s probably like piss compared to what I’m sure you’re used to, but I thought it might be nice anyway?”  
It is not as if I could have expected him to know how much I despised the stuff, not without me having told him.  
I shake my head, “No, no I don’t care about cheapness,” I say, placing my hand quickly on his arm in reassurance, then turning back to my paper.  
I do not care about cheapness. I hate all remchik equally.  
Costis is relieved. He kisses me again, lips to my temple, walks inside, talking over his shoulder as he goes about what he wants to cook tonight, about his day, about how beautiful the sky is.  
After being with him for so long, I am very good at knowing how to hide my feelings from him. Certainly much better than I had been. I don’t usually want him to be ignorant of what I feel - usually these days I am happy, and am happy to let him know that. I don’t need him to know when I hate everything, that would only burden the both of us.  
I sit still in the warmth of the fading sun, no longer feeling its warmth. The soft hum of the insects is transforming in my mind until it is a harsh buzz drilling into my ears.  
Costis is bustling around inside, humming, unaware of the storm in my head, which is of course for the best. 

I know I will get no more writing done today, but I do not dare go inside. If I go inside he might mention the remchik again. He might suggest we drink it.  
How are you supposed to tell someone, someone you love, that you fear that if you even smell a certain drink you will spew out all of your organs. If I could explain it away easily I would. I have known people, my master included, who shied away from certain drinks after drinking them once too often in excess. The mere thought of them could cause nausea.  
This is not what this was, and I preferred not to lie outright to Costis about it.  
Maybe I could keep my feelings more securely hidden from him now, but not my lies.  
Maybe I should have agreed with him when he was worried about the cheapness, I could have been my usual tactless self and told him there was no way I would drink such cheap swill. Now that I had saved his feelings though, I couldn’t very well use that excuse. 

I sit outside as long as I can without causing suspicion, then shuffle my papers into a near tidy stack and take them inside.  
Costis is setting our small table, and smiles when I come inside.  
He knows how much I appreciate my solitude, and I know how much he enjoys my presence.  
“How was your day?” he asks, glancing up from the table top.  
I shrug in reply, then force myself to speak aloud so as to appear normal. “It was a beautiful day. I barely got enough of importance done, however, so probably a waste.” 

Costis laughs, shakes his head, “You deserve a break,” he tells me, “No day is a waste.” 

I can simply never understand how he is always so full of optimism. I know it’s not because he’s a simpleton who doesn’t understand the evils of the world, even if that is what I had first assumed. He tends to encounter darkness and then decide he would prefer to talk about the sunshine instead. It doesn’t usually irritate me, but today it does. 

“This day was absolutely a waste,” I counter sharply, dropping my papers with a muted thump onto my desk. “I wrote nothing for Relius, copied no scrolls, simply sat and meandered on about my thoughts, which are of no use to anyone.” 

I wonder how he puts up with my continual darkness. He is rolling his eyes. That’s how. 

“Kamet, Kamet,” he sighs, crossing the room now to peer at the dinner he has prepared us, “If I didn’t know how highly you thought of your own thoughts I might be worried. As it is,” He lifts his eyebrows at me, “I’m simply curious as to what put you in such a terrible mood.” 

I scowl at him, not in the mood for light-hearted teasing.  
“Your good mood has,” I tell him meanly, but he only laughs again, then sobers quickly and dramatically for my benefit. 

“Oh my poor Kamet,” he says, “I have truly been careless with my joy of late,” his hand is at his forehead in a poor show of sorrow, and I scowl all the more at him.  
Obviously my original plan of showing him no sign of my discontent was through, but I thought maybe I could wash past it all with a bad temper instead.  
He walks back across the room to pull me and my black cloud of a scowl into his arms, and presses a kiss to my temple.  
“Are you truly so mad, my love?” He asks of me, and I exhale loudly. I can never help but soften slightly whenever he calls me his love. It is truly a sly move of his to get the upper hand, but I cannot be angry at him for it.  
I wriggle in his grip, but only for show, I don’t want him to release me, and he knows that.  
“Only in an easily irritated mood,” I tell him, which is true, “The noise of the heat today has kept me unfocused.” Untrue. 

“Hmm,” Costis hums against my skin, and my eyes close at the closeness. I could almost forget my tenseness, almost.  
“I would believe you,” Costis is saying now, lips still on me, “If it weren’t for the fact I saw you as relaxed and carefree as the breeze when I arrived home.”  
Sometimes I hate him.  
“An act,” I grumble and he laughs. I wish he would stop laughing at me.  
“My love,” he says again and this time I don’t let it soften me, “My love, you must think me a fool.”  
I do not think him a fool. I’ve made that mistake too many times in the past to even consider it as an option now.  
“No,” I say firmly.  
“So it is the remchik?” he asks me, and of course he knows. He is never a fool, but I am.  
“No,” I say firmly.  
“I can get rid of it easily if you would like?” he offers.  
I could say yes now and he would know, or I could say no and have to put up with it being so near me.  
I relent enough to nod my head, just slightly.  
“I will do so immediately then,” he tells me calmly, wraps his arms around me briefly to squeeze me in a tight embrace, then steps away to collect the bottle.  
On his way out of the door with it, he stops, “Would you like to serve the dinner?” he asks, “I’ll be back very soon.” 

As I spoon out the food that Costis has cooked for us, I wonder how he is planning on disposing of the offending item. Surely as he wants dinner served he is not going into town to return it. I wonder if he plans on simply hiding it away somewhere in the outskirts of the garden.  
He comes back far too quickly for him to have been to town, too quickly to have found a good hiding spot either. I look at him inquisitively from where I sit at the table.  
“I threw the bottle over the edge of the cliff,” he tells me, “Maybe not the wisest choice, but I very much doubt we’ll see it again.”  
As much as he denies it, my Costis has a very strong dramatic streak. I had often mused about whether or not he had acquired it from his king, but letters from his sister Thalia had informed me otherwise. ‘Subtly dramatic,’ she had called him, ‘Where he doesn’t even realise he is so extravagant’. It was true, he often did things because he was so certain that it was just and right, so he did them with as much justice and righteousness he could muster, which was a hell of a lot. 

I reach my hand out to his as he sits down opposite me, squeezes his hand in unspoken thanks, and we eat. I feel guilty, I know he had been trying to make me happy and I had reacted entirely opposite to his expectations, but he looked untroubled. I thought he would probably worry about it for a time, but so long as I didn’t bring it up again, continued to squeeze his hands and smile at him, I didn’t think he would be upset.

It doesn’t occur to me until a few days later as I sit in the temple, surrounded by screeds of scrolls and words to write, that I had no idea where Costis would have even bought the bottle in the first place. It wasn’t as if it was an extremely rare strange find, but it was something that I hadn’t seen around Roa before, it wasn’t really to their taste.  
I frown at my papers, determined to use my break to find out the source. I knew I shouldn’t keep poking at this bruise, that knowing where it was sold wouldn’t help me much, but I also knew that if I didn’t find out I would drive myself crazy. Also, I told myself, if I know where it is I can avoid it in the future.  
Before I leave to go look, I sit and think about the path home Costis usually takes, and visited along there first, no need to wander aimlessly.  
I visit all the small stalls, then the merchants’ shops, and find nothing. Most know of what I’m talking about but deny having ever stocked it. A few offer to order some in if I’d like it, but I decline hastily, drawing more than a few confused looks I am sure. 

I wait until after we’ve finished eating, and then I insist on clearing away our plates. He stands beside me, wiping down his cooking utensils and our pot while I wipe the plates.  
“Where did you buy the remchik from?” I ask, with as much casualness as I can muster. I know he will not be fooled by my offhand tone, but I didn’t want to cause too much of a scene.  
He only glances down at me for a moment in confusion before he answered.  
“A traveling merchant in the inn I stopped by with a few of my friends,” he tells me, forehead furrowed. “He was from one of the outer towns in Medea, and when I mentioned I had a friend from the empire, he suggested I buy a gift of remchik for you to remind you of home. I thought it was blatantly pushy, but I also thought he might be right. I’ve not seen him around town since, so I assume he’s left.”  
He tells me the full scenario because he knows my obsession with details and context. He is very considerate of my feelings.  
I nod, focusing on the plates, feeling his gaze down on me.  
“Why do you ask?”  
“I was simply curious. I had not seen remchik sold anywhere here before.”  
Now he nods, willing, but not happy to let the conversation end if I want it to.  
I consider it as I put away our plates. As I take food scraps outside to the compost. As we sit together on the couch, a blanket tossed over our legs. He is whittling away at a soft piece of wood while I very slowly knit beside him.  
My fear is a lot less volatile now that I am not being confronted with the physical bottle, the idea of drinking it, of smelling it on Costis’ breath. I am not afraid that he will bring anymore of it into our home, but I wonder if he will feel more at ease if I tell him why it troubled me so much. Of course, it might make him less at ease, I know he already feels badly about upsetting me, knowing the context around that itself may make things worse.  
I take a gamble, and put my knitting down.  
“The day we met in the palace,” I begin, dropping each word down slowly into the empty air. He looks up at me, lowers his craft.  
“I hadn’t been out of my office properly for quite a while. I had kept myself inside while I healed after a beating, hadn’t been paying much attention to anything that occurred outside of my walls.”  
I don’t want to linger too long on the finer details of it, I know Costis hates the thought of what my life had been, even if I had tried to persuade him it wasn’t all bad.  
“I got the beating after wrongfully assuming Nahuseresh had received good news, and I had welcomed him home with remchik, which he didn’t appreciate.” I shrug. “It was a foolish mistake, and one I paid for dearly for several weeks after, but, when I learned the false news of his death, I blamed myself. I thought that if I had only held my presumption then I would not have been beaten, and then I wouldn’t have been confined in my rooms until I was well again, and then I would have been as aware as I usually was of the politics and threats forever surrounding us, and somehow, Nahuseresh would not have been killed.” I hold my hands up in acceptance that this was a ridiculous notion, and continue. “For too long on our journey I told myself that if I had only been a better slave, a smarter slave, more worthy of my price, than my master would not be dead, I would not be scared for my life, and the slaves in my household would not have been killed. All over a glass of remchik that was never even drunk.”  
To my surprise, I don’t feel overly upset after spilling the words out of my mouth, so I look at Costis to see how he sees it.  
First of all he sees it as worthy of a kiss, which he plants softly on my lips before leaning back again to smile at me.  
“Thank you,” he says, “For telling me. I admit, I have been worrying.”  
I lean against him, nudging at his shoulder until he lifts his arm to wrap around me, and I close my eyes. I am glad he was not breathing fire about the mention of my beating, but I wasn’t finished with my explanation yet, and would prefer to continue when I knew he could not easily leap to his feet with anger. It was of no use to leap to your feet in anger when the man you are angry at lives across a vast and deep sea.  
“I was never fond of remchik before this happened, though,” I tell him, head rolled back against his shoulder so I was facing the ceiling, but my eyes still shut.  
He makes a noise to show he is listening and waiting. His arm is relaxed around me, his other hand reaching to take mine. These types of nights are his favourite. When we are both home and the light has not yet faded from the sky, our stomachs are heavy with food, and his arms are heavy with me. Had I been told when I first met the hunk of a man that this Attolian was, that his favourite past time was holding hands on a couch, I would not have believed it.  
“It has a very strong taste, difficult to get out of your mouth, and very potent effects. Because of this, my master-” Costis makes a noise, and I open my eyes to glance up at him before I realise what he objects to. “-Nahuseresh-” I amend, and Costis squeezes me slightly.  
“Because of this, Nahuseresh would only drink it when he had cause for celebration, or when he was in anger with everything and everyone. When he was celebrating, I was never worried, his moods were…often unpredictable, but once he got drunk happy he stayed happy. When he was angry it was obviously a different story. He is already volatile and prone to lashing out when he is angry, but once he is drunk on remchik he seemed to focus all of his wild emotions into making whatever was affecting him into the fault of someone easily at hand and uncomplaining.”  
Costis is tense against me, but does not interrupt. I am glad, because if he did I would not be able to bring myself to continue the story.  
“It wasn’t a common occurrence, he knew it was bad for his hierarchy if his head slave always seemed to be out of favour. After – after his return from Attolia, his moods worsened, as you may well imagine, and we were out of court for quite some time so his appearances did not matter as much. I was often the way he… outsourced his anger, and all of it was accompanied by the smell, by the taste of remchik.” I lift my shoulders in a very small impression of a casual shrug. “I know it is stupid, but I don’t want to taste remchik ever again, and I especially don’t want to taste it on your lips like I did on his.”

Costis makes a strangled noise against me. His face is pressed into the side of mine, his neck must be twisted abominably.  
“It is not stupid,” Costis says, his voice little more than a growl, although it’s obvious he is attempting to temper it.  
I had often wondered how much of this he must have already guessed, picked out from my reactions to things. My flinches when he moves too quickly in our darkened bedroom, my condemnation of all drunkenness.  
“No?” I ask, voice carefully light, “It often feels as if it is.”  
“My love,” he says, firm, “If it had been me, I would have smashed the bottle right out of my hands the moment I saw it. If anything, you are far too sensible.”  
I shift my head so he is forced to lift his own and stop hurting his neck with his desire to be close.  
“But then the smell would have been all over our garden, all over you,” I counter.  
“Ah yes,” he nods, “I suppose I would have let my emotions have got the best of me, to my own detriment then, if I had been you.”  
We are silent a moment longer, his arm still tight around me.  
He says, “Thank you, again, for telling me. I want to be able to share your burdens where I can.”  
Whatever could I have done to please the gods so much that they rewarded me with Costis.  
“I am simply sorry that it upsets you,” I reply and he shakes his head, tugs at me until I climb into his lap so he can hold me wrapped in his embrace.  
“You are here with me now,” he says, “And I thank the gods daily for that.”  
Maybe I had done nothing so worthy of the gods rewards, maybe they had put us together because it caused Costis to praise them with more regularity.  
And that was that. Costis was not too obviously extra gentle with me for the following few days, knowing that I liked to keep my pride high. I came home earlier in the evenings so he could hold me longer, and over the many months we mostly forgot about the bottle of remchik. 

I had been deep in our garden, weeding carefully around my prized plants and tending to the flowers. It was a rare day of winter in which the sun was out in its full pale glory, and I intended to make the most of it. Warming my skin and avoiding mud.  
I was on my way inside, not quite finished, but in desperate need for a bite to eat and a quick drink, when I realised that our door was sitting open.  
I frowned. It was unlike me to leave the door open in winter, even on a warmish day like today. I tried to preserve what heat I had cultivated inside, and then keep it in there. I sighed heavily, Costis had probably been too eager to get inside and divest himself of his work clothes to bother latching the door properly. I shut it behind me, and smiled to myself. I could hear Costis in our room and I was absolutely going to tell him off, but not too harshly, because he was home early and I liked it when he was home early.  
The door to our room is open as well, unsurprising, but it gave me and my poor eyesight the first chance to tell that something was wrong, because the blurry figure I could see across the room, just out of my clarity, was much too lithe to be my soldier.  
I stopped, just before the doorway, utterly confused. I knew that unless they spoke or I stepped closer, I would not be able to make out who they were, but I was unwilling to move closer to someone I couldn’t recognise in my bedroom.  
I know the figure had seen me, but they stood silent, as if looking me over, finally, they spoke, and my stomach, which had been tying itself into knots, fell to my feet. 

“Kamet, I had not taken you for a gardener. You never used to like getting your hands dirty,” Nahuseresh said, his voice all charm and sweetness.  
It makes absolutely zero sense for my master (former master, Costis’ voice echoes in my head), to be standing in my bedroom in Roa. I was sure he must have been spitting for revenge after I had been stolen yes, but never in my wildest dreams would I have thought that he would risk himself to come after me. That is what the Namreen are for. That is what having piles of gold is for. My expression must have been obvious, because I can hear the sneer in his voice.  
“Don’t flatter yourself, my dear,” he says, “I am not here solely on account of you. It is just a happy coincidence, shall we say.” He is stepping towards me now and his face gets clearer with every moment.  
He looks just as I remember him, if possible, even more like how I imagine him to look than he used to – although that is probably just the spite twisting his face.  
I take a faltering step backwards, thinking of running. With all of my new hobbies and activities that come from being with Costis I was much stronger and quicker than I had ever been before. I thought if I slammed the door and ran now while Nahuseresh was still a few feet away, I might be able to make it out of the house, and then maybe down the path, and onto the road, and if I made it onto the road then it was a possibility I could make it to town, or at least make enough noise for someone to come save me. Then I thought that Nahuseresh is not a fool. He would have guards surrounding my tiny house, waiting for me to run out into their arms. He nodded it at me.  
“Don’t run Kamet, I would like us to talk, and it is less companionable if you have to be dragged back to the conversation by my men outside.”  
I nod back at him, conceding my easy defeat.  
I think back to the idea that Costis had been a gift to me from the gods, and realise that it wasn’t true. I was simply a play thing, something to dangle beauty in front of and then take it away.  
I can imagine Costis frowning at me, he would not agree. I straighten my already slumping shoulders, and take another step backwards as Nahuseresh nears me.  
He reaches out and I jerk backwards, I half expect him to grab at me again but he simply lowers his hand and looks at me with that expression.  
“Kamet, I only want to see you, don’t be difficult.”  
I think of all the strength he has over me, despite my new muscles and this time I stay still when he reaches out and takes my face roughly. He twists my head this way and that, as if there is so much new to look at. My hair is somewhat longer, I have an earring in one ear, a gift from Costis, new scars from my journey. The one on my forehead from the Namreen he stares at the longest, as if he’s both pleased and angry at it being there. He touches it, jabs at it, with one finger.  
“I see you’ve been fighting,” he sounds more pleased than angry now an I desperately want to pull my chin out of his grasp, but I think that if I try I won’t succeed and will just look stupid and weak. I have had enough of being stupid and weak, so I want to limit it as much as possible. I stand there.  
“Kamet, I am wounded, two long years apart and you have nothing to say to me? Surely you have missed me?”  
I can feel that part of myself longing to bend my neck in a slight bow, to whisper that I am sorry, that of course I have missed him, my master.  
But that would be a lie. And I try not to lie when I can help it.  
“If you are not here for me,” I say, sounding braver than I am, “Why are you here? There is nothing in Roa of use to you.”  
Nahuseresh finally lets go of my face, leaving aching imprints on my skin, he laughs and puts his hand heavy on my shoulder.  
“My dear, sweet Kamet,” he says, “Just because you serve a new master now doesn’t mean that I have gone and gotten stupid.” I can hear the edge in his voice now, he’s done with being sweet and light. “I know that if that arrogant goat-foot wanted you here, he has something else here that he wants and needs. My men are sweeping the temple as we speak, and even if we find nothing of use, at least we will have his pet guard, and of course, you, who I have oh so dearly missed.”  
I thought I was already as tense as I could be with worry, but at the mention of Costis my heart clenches and threatens to stop. I had so hoped that somehow Nahuseresh would not know of how much the king relied on Costis. I wondered if he knew how much I relied on Costis.  
“You have the soldier, then?” I ask, attempting to sound as if my heart wasn’t bleeding into my lungs as I spoke.  
Nahuseresh eyed me strangely. No luck there then, he had been in our bedroom after all. I don’t know how long he had been in our house, but he had probably seen ample enough evidence of the fact that there was only one large bed, that the chairs were positioned close together, that the house was a home.  
“I must admit,” he said slowly, not answering me, “That I was surprised to hear of your dalliance with the soldier. I thought you above that type of man.”  
I had thought so as well, until I had met Costis. I repeated my earlier question, and Nahuseresh curled his lip at me in disdain.  
“Please,” he sneered, “I have no need to send my soldiers out to get him, he will come here, unaware of my presence and I will have snared him without needing to go to any effort.”  
That was almost a comfort then. If Costis stayed late out than maybe Nahuseresh would tire and we would just leave. Or Maybe Costis would hear of the disruption at the temple and would realise what was happening and flea to let the king know.  
That was a foolish fantasy, I knew that if Costis suspected me to be in danger, he would come for me. There was no point in trying to escape to Attolia, Nahuseresh would be gone and so would I before he could get any help. And Costis was far too honourable for his own good to save his own skin and not mine. I was selfishly pleased at this, I wanted him to come for me.  
It was no longer a comfort.  
Nahuseresh was speaking, cutting through my hurried thoughts, and I stared at him.  
“I was thinking, while we wait, we ought to have a drink, for old times sake.”  
In his hands, he held a bottle of remchik. It wasn’t his usual expensive stock, instead, it was identical to the bottle Costis had presented me with those many months ago. I thought of the Mede merchant, wondered how he had so easily put two and two together. 

“I think you must be as surprised as I was,” Nahuseresh smiled at me, “When a poor merchant, selling this shit, told me the secret of your whereabouts.”  
I was not surprised anymore, resigned to the fact that the gods must be watching in great amusement at the misery they were pouring down upon me.  
Taking me painfully by the hand, Nahuseresh leads me away from my bedroom, to my own cups, and pours me a drink in my own house.  
He commands me sit, and I sit, him sitting opposite me in my own seat, me in Costis’.  
“To reunions,” He tells me, lifts his cup towards me and drinks.  
I do not touch my cup. I breathe slowly through my mouth. I do not look at it.  
As Nahuseresh refills his cup, he looks at me pointedly, takes my hand in his and folds it around the cup.  
“Drink with me,” he says sharply, quaffs back his drink.  
I think of the sharp knife by the block of cheese under the cloth on the bench. I think maybe if he drinks enough he will be a little less quick, a little less cunning, and maybe I could get to it before he could stop me. I feel the roughness of the cup under my fingers, and under Nahuseresh’s watchful eye, I lift the drink and swallow it down.  
When I put it back on the table, clumsily, trying my utmost not to vomit, not to panic and cry, Nahuseresh is smiling at me.  
“There,” he says, “That was easy wasn’t it? Now it feels more like it used to.”  
I lift my shaking hand to cover my mouth, press my fingers hard against my lips until my teeth cut flesh. Nahuseresh is refilling our cups.  
“I have fond memories of drinking with you, my dear Kamet,” my master says, and my stomach almost revolts. I remember that I was hungry and thirsty when I entered the house, and now the only thing inside me is remchik and bile.  
I think, gods please, let me die before he gets drunk. I think, gods please, let him die before he gets drunk.  
“What are you going to do with me?” I ask him, voice trickling out between my fingers. I do not think he can want me as his slave again, surely not after the embarrassment of my first being stolen from right under his nose, and then reappearing to work for his rival.  
He narrows his eyes at me, his lips twitching. “I have not fully decided yet,” he says finally, swirling the remchik in his cup. “The only thing that is truly clear to me is that you must be punished, you have been exceedingly disobedient, in many ways.” He looks up at the house we are sitting in as he speaks, his disdain obvious.  
I had been expecting punishment, but it is the unknown that scares me the most. I think again of the bread knife. I do not know if I am strong enough to push it into him.  
He waves at me to drink again, and I do, matching my movements to his and swallowing in one easy moment. I have done this a million times, the movements are as natural to me as walking, so is the nausea that follows each mouthful. It is harder now though, having thought I would never again drink this, especially not with him.  
The next cup, I choke on, it gets caught on the lump in my throat, and I sputter wetly, it escapes my mouth down the front of my dirt stained tunic. My master watches, unimpressed.  
“You have gotten much less refined since leaving me,” he tells me, and it stings me even though I know it should not. “I realise now I should have expected you to be so disgusting after spending so much of your time with Attolians filling your head with their barbarian ideas. I had been hoping you were smarter than that though, that you would not be swayed.”  
I nod my head in agreement, my eyes wet, my shirt clinging to me reeking of alcohol. I bow my head in chagrin.  
“My dear,” he says dryly, “Let us not waste time with your misery. Tell me about why you left me.”  
I would do anything not to keep drinking, so I nod again. I reach for the bottle, fill his cup again and he smiles at me, pleased.  
“I was told that you were dead,” I tell him, and he raises his eyebrows at me before drinking. I fill his cup again and he waves his hand at me,  
“Do tell me,” he says, “Why you would leave me just because you thought I was dead.” He motions for me to fill my own cup as well, so I do.  
“I thought, because the Attolian had already come to me, that if I left with them then all suspicion of your death would fall on me, and the rest of the household would not be suspect. I hoped to save them as much as I could.”  
I am scoffed at.  
“You have never been so noble, Kamet. That is part of the reason I liked you as much as I did. Would you not have suspected one of the household to have killed me though? Did you really want them to place the blame on you and not on the true criminal?”  
I wonder how I can phrase it so I don’t tell him outright that I thought he had been killed by his emperor, or even by his brother. I decided it’s not worth it. Swallow my cupful, and shake my head.  
“I was worried you had offended our emperor,” I say carefully, “And he was responding.”  
My master is angry. He swallows what is in his cup and holds it out for more.  
“I was out of favour,” he tells me sharply, “I was, and I am still important.”  
I wonder what I will do after I stab him. If he will die and then I will have to sit and think about how to escape the guards, or if he will live and kill me on the spot.  
“Of course, my master, I was foolish and worried. I should never have doubted,” I whisper.  
He reaches for me, hands languid, and it takes all I have not to throw up on him as he tugs me closer to him over the table.  
At all times, you can smell his hair oil. I should have noticed when I had walked inside from the garden, but it was just another familiar scent that I hadn’t bothered paying attention to. With him this close, it stings my nose.  
Costis smells like the earth. Like fresh sweat, before it begins smelling dirty and stale. Like Basil from the garden. Like rain after drought.  
“Maybe I will keep you,” He tells me, I am cross eyed trying to keep my eyes on him. “You have always been so very good at being sorry.”  
I can feel the panic setting in. My fingers feel numb with it, my legs heavy like lead, my lungs hard rocks in my rib cage.  
I close my eyes and let him kiss me.  
His beard, stiff with oil, scratching me with painful familiarity. I am glad Costis is clean shaven. I wish I had kissed him once more before he had left this morning. I think of the knife with the cheese. The cheese is Costis’ favourite, he likes it slab thick on fresh bread with olives.  
“I do not deserve to be kept,” I tell him when he finally pulls away, would rather be tortured and hung then sit again with him and drink.  
“No, you don’t.” he tells me, “But you might be able to make it up to me somehow.”  
I can’t feel my face. I force it somehow into a smile, and lift my numb fingers to his cheek.  
“Let me start trying, by giving you some food. It is not much, but the cheese is good quality, almost like what we had in the palace.”  
He holds me to him still, me awkwardly leaning over the table, one hand splayed on the top trying to keep my balance, the other on his oil sticky face. He looks me over, then nods.  
“We will see,” he says, and then, “I am hungry.”  
He releases me, and I stagger backwards, almost tripping up on my chair. I steady it, hoping he thinks that it is the remchik to blame, and walk slowly to the bench where I uncover the cheese.  
I keep my back to him, trying to hide my movements from him as I reach with one hand for a plate, with the other for the knife.  
I try and think of how good I was at being a slave, how sweet I could be when he wanted me to, how I knew what he wanted. I try not to think of Costis. I was never going to see him again, but maybe I could arrange it so that he would never have to meet my master.  
I turn to face him, and his eyes are on me, beady and hungry. I walk slowly, so my legs won’t give out, so my numb fingers won’t slip.  
He can see the intention in my eyes, I still know how to do that, and he pushes his chair slightly away from the table, so that I can climb onto his knee, facing him, plate gripped firmly in one hand.  
“I see you are working hard on making it up to me, dear,” my master is smiling, his hand already gripping me tight by the waist.  
Balancing my wrist on his shoulder so as to keep the plate steady, I reach around him with my other hand to break off a piece of cheese to feed him.  
He takes it with his mouth from my hand, keeps his eyes on me at all times. I reach around him again to the plate, and lean forward to kiss him while he still has cheese in his mouth.  
I fumble and drop the plate, but he doesn’t care. Neither do I, the knife in my hand, which I had been trapping flat against the bottom of the plate, was heavy with promise. I take my hand, no longer holding the plate, and cup his jaw, holding him in place while I kiss him as I swiftly slit his neck.  
Costis had been teaching me how to hold weapons. It had taken him a long time to persuade me into agreeing to be taught. Even now I still did not like to hold anything bigger than a kitchen knife. But he had shown me how to block with my small knife, how to stab where it would do the most damage. He’d brought us home meat, still alive, and taught me how to slit their throats, break their necks. It was brutal, and I hated it with intensity, but I wanted to learn. I wanted to be useful and capable.  
I can taste Nahuseresh’s blood in my mouth and I pull away, disgusted and terrified, and so panicked.  
There was a heavy spray of hot blood all down my shirt, on my face, my pants, my hands. I all but fell as I got off of Nahuseresh’s gushing body. I fell on one side of the chair, his body fell on the other and bleed all over my beautiful floor. I knew I should check, even though it seemed obvious that he was dead, I knew I should check that I had truly done it, but I couldn’t move. I lay on my floor, sobbing into the blood dripping off me, my whole body shaking. I could not even feel relieved as I lay there in the blood of the one man I had ever wished to kill. I was horrified of how easy it had been, easier then slitting a goat’s throat. I threw up, all the remchik I had barely kept down, and bile. I retched over and over again until my guts felt like they would come out my mouth.  
When I sat up, I hoped that Costis would be smart enough not to come home. That he would go to Attolia and not see Nahuseresh’s dead body, would not see my puke mingled with blood. Would not see the bottle of remchik that had led them here, still sitting on the table. I did not want him to think that this could have been his fault in anyway. It was my own fault, for even daring to hope that I could escape myself.  
I forced myself to stand, my legs shaking so hard I had to hold myself up on the table until I could calm myself.  
I stagger to the door, thinking that if I am lucky, the guards will not be lurking right outside, but will stay wherever they had been when I had come in. Just to the side of the door is a water pump, and I pull myself to it, using the little strength I have in me to wash as much of the blood and remchik vomit as I can off me. I am still crying, but I can’t be bothered trying to stop myself. I can either control my legs or my tears, but not both, and having working legs was much more useful than dry eyes.  
When no one comes to tear me to my feet and run me through, I lie there in the wet dirt and cry more. I think, the longer I stay here the more likely it is that Costis will come home. The longer I stay here the more likely it is that they will kill Costis. I think, if I stand up now and walk down the path until I find the guards or they find me, then they will kill me or take me away but Costis might live. I think about Nahuseresh’s words, that I am not noble, and I agree, I am often so very selfish. But Costis is not selfish. If you sliced him open he would be noble to the core. And I cannot lie here in the dirt waiting for him to walk into his death.  
So I drag myself to my feet, and I shut our front door because I don’t want to let the cold in. I straighten my shoulders and breathe in and out as deeply as I can, and I walk out into the open, down our path.  
I do not see the guards, and I am confused, and cautious. I think maybe they are waiting out by the road.  
I can hear my name being called.  
For a moment I think it is Nahuseresh, not yet dead, calling out to me one last time. I never did check to see if his heart still thumped. He could be lying there, bleeding out, cursing my name to the gods. Then my name is called again and my heart, which was already cut up into small jagged pieces, broke all over again. It was Costis. I could hear his foot beats heavy on the dusty road, coming closer.  
If I can hear Costis, then the guards can hear Costis, and I have not come across them yet because they are lurking out by the road behind the trees to catch him before he makes it to me.  
My sobs are so painful they feel as if they are being torn out of me, and I stumble forwards faster than before, tripping on the stones in the path. I burst out onto the road, intent on screaming at the guards to take only me. That their lord was lying inside my house bleeding out all over my once clean floors.  
There is only Costis, running towards me, his face white and terrified, blood on his hands and face, his sword blade out and naked.  
I look to the trees and see no one, I think they must be hiding behind me, coming up to stab us both in the back, but I can’t turn, my panic has me standing still as a statue but for the heave of my chest.  
Costis is dropping his sword and I want to yell at him to pick it up, that he’s still in danger, how dare he endanger himself like that. Costis is pulling me to him, his fingers are on my face, my chest, my arms, looking for wounds to explain the blood, to explain my sobs. Costis is dropping to his knees and pulling me down with him to fold up against his chest.  
“Kamet, oh my gods, Kamet, love, are you hurt?” Costis is panting, his voice is breaking and trembling but I can do nothing but shake my head, then nod my head, then shake it again. My face is so numb I cannot move my mouth, or feel the tears on my cheeks.  
We sit on the rocky road, Costis holding me so tight against him that I may as well be part of his body, me crying hoarsely. Him crying freely as he rubs my back.  
No one is attacking us and I feel like an idiot.  
When I can finally breathe without crying I pull enough away from him to look him in the face.  
“There were Namreen all through the temple,” he told me, his voice rough with crying, “A priest came and found me and my friends on our break and we went there and dealt with them. I didn’t know they were Namreen until I got there, until one had killed the man on my left. I wanted to leave the temple as soon as I realised, come to you, but I couldn’t get away until they were all dead. Gods, Kamet, I am so sorry, I never meant to leave you alone.” He is gasping and choking on his words, and I pull myself further out of his grip so that I can pull him into my arms instead. A much harder feat seeing as my arms barely go around him.  
“There were no Namreen here,” I tell him, realising it now myself, “My capture was not a priority for the emperor. It was you that they were after.” I truly am a selfish fool. To think that Costis was safe so long as he didn’t come home. He is much more valuable to the king than I am, a better bargaining tool by far, and certainly more chance of getting useful information out of.  
“How, what then?” He is slowly pulling himself together, and he plucks at my sopping shirt, wet with water and blood and remchik. I had not done such a good job at washing it in my panic.  
I don’t want to tell him, but if I don’t tell him then we can never go inside.  
“The emperor wanted you,” I tell him, “Nahuseresh wanted me.”  
I truly am holding a soldier in my arms, because he stiffens and sits up, almost entirely composed, his eyes glinting. I have never been able to tell if he is more angry at Nahuseresh on my behalf, or on the kings. I like to think that it is on mine.  
His next movements are not those of a soldier though. He takes my face gently in his hands and looks at me, “My darling,” he says, “I am sorry.” He knows Nahuseresh must be dead for me to be sitting here on the road with him, covered in blood that is obviously not mine.  
I turn my face in his hands and lift my own to hold them to me.  
“I cut his throat,” I whisper into his palm, and Costis looks so sorrowful that I could have begun weeping all over again. “I let him kiss me in our house, I fed him your cheese, and then I cut his throat and got his blood in my mouth, but all I could taste was the remchik, and I, I, I”  
I can’t go on. I suspect that I had already said too much.  
Costis says nothing, just holds me close, rocks me. I don’t know whose blood is whose anymore, it’s everywhere I look.  
I know what I am about to ask is most likely the most ridiculous one to ask in this situation, but the longer I sit in Costis’ arms the sicker I feel as I think about it.  
“Are you angry at me?” I ask him and his whole-body tenses like he’s been hit. For a moment I think he has, but he peels away from me too slowly.  
“Kamet,” He looks at a loss for words, “Kamet – no. No. I am – I am caught between being proud of you and sorrowful for you, and furious at him, but never you.”  
I look up at him.  
“He is bleeding all over our floor,” I say. Then I say, “I thought I would never see you again.”  
Costis does not kiss me on the lips, he kisses my cheek, “I am here,” he says, “And so are you.” 

He has to talk to guards before we go back to our house. They surround him looking as weary as him, priests flitting everywhere, townspeople yelling about gods knows what. They send a message to the king of Attolia. Costis holds me to his side through it all and I do not speak, even when my friends from the temple, who I am very glad to see still alive, come to tell me that they are glad to see me alive as well. I nod, and I smile the best I can, and I pretend I am not covered in blood. Someone pulls Costis’ shirt aside to bandage him, and I can only stare, horrified that I had not noticed that some of the blood was his.  
When we walk slowly up the path back to the house, I can feel my feet dragging with every step, my face going numb again. Costis turns to look at me, sits down in the middle of the path and holds me until I can breathe again. He asks if I would like to stay outside in the garden while he goes inside. Wraps the body. Cleans the blood. I cannot bear the thought of him leaving my sight, so I shake my head and walk by his side into the house.  
I want to sit down, but I don’t want to sit in either of the dining chairs, slick with blood, and I don’t want to sit on any of the clean furniture and get the blood on me on them. So I stand by the doorway and press my hands against my mouth,  
Costis checks that Nahuseresh is truly dead. He drags the body outside, wraps it in our spare canvas awning, ties it together with cheap rope. He takes our bucket, fills it at the tap outside and pours it all over our floors, which tilt smartly towards the door, washing the murder out. I follow him, like a duckling at his heels as he goes back in and out of the house for more water to pour on the floors, as he pulls of his blood ruined shirt and uses it to rub drier blood off the wood. I stand in the middle of the doorway as he sits outside by the pump and wipes the blood off our chairs, then goes inside to wipe the blood off our table. There is too much blood. He walks around me, still in the doorway as he fills our biggest pot with water, as he sets it to heat, as he fills the bucket again. Then he motions me towards him and I go, let him pull my shirt off over my head. He sits me down on the bench by the door, uses my own shirt to wipe at the muck covering me. Dirt, remchik sticky and cheap, vomit, blood, sweat. He takes of my trousers, leaving me shivering slightly in the air, and then douses me with the bucket of water. He takes his own trousers off, scrubs for a moment at his own legs, then goes inside, me, dripping steadily, following silently after as he fetches a towel and wraps me in it. 

I sit, wrapped in towelling, on his lap on the floor as he rubs feeling into my back and arms and legs and feet and hands and cheeks.  
When the water is hot enough, he tips it into our small bath, which he drags out to sit by the table, and cools it down with water from the pump outside. He fetches me soap, and sweet oil, helps me into the water.  
Once I am in the water, starting to feel less like I am encased in death, I look up at Costis, I reach for him and he kisses me very carefully.  
I am not sure there is anything that either of us can say that would be useful at this moment, so I bathe silently, Costis scrubbing my back, pouring water over my hair to rinse it. When I climb out, he gets in, it’s too small for us to both sit in it together, and I stand naked beside him, warm scented water puddling at my feet as I rub his back and pour water over his hair.  
When we are both towelled dry, the water thrown out, and our door locked, I checked three times, I remember that Nahuseresh had been in our bedroom.  
There is no sign of him having been in the room. Maybe small things have been moved just slightly, but not enough that either of us notice. I feel sick at getting into a bed which he might have touched though, and I strip the sheets off our thin mattress. We are going to have to do a lot of washing tomorrow.  
I just want to go to bed now. To sleep until everything feels better, but Costis, kisses me, tells me we need to eat to feel better. He leaves me in our bedroom, just for a moment, the door open, talking loudly so I can hear him while I can’t see him.  
He returns with a loaf of semi fresh bread, a pot of yogurt, some dried meat, a jug of wine.  
I do not think he likes that cheese anymore.  
We sit on our freshly made bed, clothed only in our damp towels, and eat the food with our hands, drink straight from the jug. I think Costis threw the cups out the door, and I do not blame him. 

I think to myself, everything will be alright now. We are both alive. Nahuseresh is dead. The city is on watch. My stomach is full, my skin is clean, my sheets are fresh. I think to myself, I almost died. Costis almost died. I almost returned to Medea, almost became part of someone else again, almost lost myself, almost threw up my heart.  
Costis smells like soap, like warm water, like wine and olive brine. He smells like fresh sweat and basil. 

We return to Attolia. The both of us are unhappy to leave Roa, to leave our work and our new friends, and our small home so sweet with the smell of us. But it is agreed, we are no longer safe there, the risks outweigh the means, we will make new friends, our small home is stained with blood and remchik. 

The king kisses us both when we see him next after our official arrival. He stands wearily between us in my chambers. He hadn’t put me in Nahuseresh’s chambers again, and I was thankful. I think Costis had been expected to return to the barracks while it was decided over what we were going to do, but I kept him with me. I thought, the king is smart enough to realise, the guards will figure it out soon enough. I do not like lying.  
I was half worried that he would be angry at me, even if he was not going to voice it. I knew that he had wanted to kill Nahuseresh himself, and instead I had killed him with a kitchen knife in a small room in Roa in the middle of a panic attack.  
“I am sorry,” the great king of Attolia says to us, his voice entirely sincere. “I did not catch Nahuseresh’s plans to attack the temple, and the two of you.”  
Neither Costis or I think he should need to apologise, and we both tell him so, but he waves us down. He looks between the two of us, obvious that he knows exactly where Costis sleeps.  
“I am simply grateful that you didn’t lose each other,” he says, “And that I didn’t have to lose either of you.”  
I wonder out loud where he will send us next, and he laughs, holds up his hands, “The gods only know,” he says, “And I am sure they will tell me soon. For now, please accept my hospitality, and the promise that I will do my best to keep you safe.” 

When he leaves us alone in our opulent chambers, I repeat what the king had said.  
“I am so grateful that I didn’t lose you,” I tell Costis, “And I am so grateful you taught me how to slice that goat’s throat, even if I yelled at you after it ruined my shirt.”


End file.
